-=> On 03-06-98  16:35, Walter Luffman did testify and affirm <=-
-=> to Robert Craft concerning Balanced Budget??? <=-
[...snip...]
 WL> both houses can be infuriatingly slow now; just imagine the
 WL> glacial pace if lawmakers had to actually read and
 WL> understand what they're voting on! 
 RC> If they *had* to read those bills, isn't it likely those
 RC> bills would quickly become more succinct and readable?
 WL> More likely, they'd find someway around whatever legal
 WL> impediments were put in place, and either just ignore all
 WL> that reading material or tell some staffer to prepare a
 WL> summary.  (Wonder how many incumbents insist on "summary
 WL> briefings" because they can't read even the simple text of
 WL> a written summary?)
I still want to see a cover sheet of a single page which
give the following information:
    Title
    Purpose
    Cost [in Dollars and Resources]
    Constitutional Authority [section and paragraph]
    Penalties
Surely that's not too much to ask, is it?
 RC> And how about flowcharting the effects of legislation and
 RC> making the flow chart part of the legislation? Too much
 RC> clarity there, hmmm?
 WL> Makes too much sense to ever happen -- unless they can
 WL> find a way to do it without being required to prove that
 WL> the charts are accurate.
Make them give it to a programmer.
 WL> already, I can hear the cries of "Unfair!" from high school
 WL> (in some cases, even college) graduates who find that they
 WL> still can't read the laws because they never actually
 WL> learned to read at high-school level.
 
 RC> And reading is such a *basic* skill. One wonders about
 RC> their mastery of all those other skills dependent upon
 RC> reading skills. 
 WL> Well, we already know they're hazy when it comes to numbers,
 WL> especially when those numbers are preceded by dollar signs.
 
 RC> It was at age seven, while spending the summer in a cast,
 RC> that I discovered the library shelves with the books with
 RC> the rocket and atom on the spine - many by Heinlein. I've
 RC> been an addict ever since.
 WL> Heinlein at age seven?  I'm impressed!
They were the juvenile series initially.
 WL> I was still on Hardy Boys and Tom Swift at that age (with a
 WL> big dollop of comics), discovered real science fiction when
 WL> I joined the Cub Scouts at age eight and started a
 WL> subscription to Boys Life, but don't think I saw my first
 WL> Heinlein until I was ten or so.  Interestingly, I
 WL> "back-slid" into Doc Savage, the Lensman series and other
 WL> pulps several years _after_ that. 
I was never big on Doc Savage, but I still have the Lensman
series. I really want to see that series done a la Star
Wars. The story line is far better and we've the special
effects to do justice to the visuals. 
... That's not what I meant - Official Clinton Quote.
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